The Web Marketing Experience

About Me

I'm a digital marketer, programmer and entrepreneur based in Dexter, MI. I've worked in the digital marketing and web development field for close to a decade. Over the course of my career, I've become adept at areas of digital marketing such as programmatic advertising, SEO, email marketing, inbound marketing, promoting businesses through social media.

I currently serve as Director of Marketing forRankings.io, an SEO agency based in Southern Illinois. We help attorneys, medical professionals, and small businesses rank their websites on the first page of Google. Our core services include onsite and offsite SEO as well as website design and programming.

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

I have given tips to people searching for employment to make
a website out of their resume. I have a lot of web development and marketing experience but I realize that others may not so I developed a template that people can copy and paste to make their own resume into a website. With some simple changes/additions of text and a few technical steps, your resume can be out on the world wide web for employers to see. Another thing that makes this more effective, especially for
those in web marketing, web design or other types of design and video work is
that you can easily guide employers to your work. For example if you have
websites that you have designed for clients or photographs or videos that you
have done, you can link to these from within the experience section of the
resume.

Making a website out of your resume can also make it easier
for an employer to communicate with you. You can provide links to email
you or to reach out to you on social media. You can also install buttons to
make it super easy for viewers to print your resume. You don’t have to be
an HTML or CSS wizard to accomplish this. A basic understanding of HTML, CSS and File Transfer Protocol programs is required. You will also need access to a file server.

FTP clients like Filezilla can be downloaded for free
however a server is a bit harder to come by. If you are enrolled at a
University, most institutions provide a small amount of space on their servers
for students to do web design work for their courses. Access is typically
free. Many colleges have rules whereby students are not allowed to use
the server to run a business online and their will most certainly be bandwidth
restrictions. Unless you are selling your resume or expect one hundred
thousand employers to view it in a week, you should be alright. If you don't attend an institution that allows for use of their servers, you can set up a hosting account and purchase a domain name for under 20 dollars. GoDaddy provides 3 month hosting services for 4.95 per month up front and you can also register a domain name there for about 12 bucks for the year. GoDaddy also provides great instructions for how to use an FTP client and get your hosting account setup so that people can visit your website.

Building your resume using HTML and CSS is rather
simple. If you have coding knowledge,
simply build it the way you would any other HTML page. If you have little or no coding knowledge, feel
free to use my template below.

<p align="left"><strong>Your Title</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>This is an unordered list. You can use this space to describe things
that you did in your previous job. You can add additional list elements by
adding <li> tags.</li>
<li>These lines can also be used to add links to examples of past work
experience whether it be videos, images, websites or social media accounts.
Virtually anything that is related to the job that you are applying for can
be linked to here.</li>
</ul>
</div>

<p align="left"><strong>Your Title</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>This is an unordered list. You can use this space to describe things
that you did in your previous job. You can add additional list elements by
adding <li> tags.</li>
<li>These line can also be used to add links to examples of past work experience
whether it be videos, images, websites or social media accounts. Virtually anything
that is related to the job that you are applying for can be linked to here.</li>
</ul>
</div>

<p align="left"><strong>Your Title</strong></p><ul>
<li>This is an unordered list. You can use this space to describe things
that you did in your previous job. You can add additional list elements by
adding <li> tags.</li>
<li>These line can also be used to add links to examples of past work experience
whether it be videos, images, websites or social media accounts. Virtually anything
that is related to the job that you are applying for can be linked to here.</li>
</ul>
</div>

<div id="title"><p class="obj"><strong>Education</strong></p></div>
<div id="education">
<table border="0">
<tr align="left">
<td style="width:400px; text-align:center;"><strong>The prestigious college you attended</strong></td>
<td style="width:300px; text-align:center;">City and State of said college</td></tr>
</table>
<p align="center">The title of the fancy degree you earned</p>
<ul>
<li>Here you can list any other fancy certificates, skills, clubs, organizations or other
fantastic things you did.</li></ul>
<table border="0"><tr align="center">
<td style="width:400px; text-align:center;"><strong>Maybe you have more than one degree</strong></td><td style="width:300px; text-align:center;">City and State</td></tr>
</table>
<p align="center">You are pretty smart if you have two degrees. Or you have no life.</p></div>
<div id="title"><p class="obj"><strong>References</strong></p></div><div id="references">
<p align="left" style="padding-bottom:50px;">
Here is a great place to list links to people on linkedin that can act as references for you.
Just like in a traditional hiring process, make sure these people are aware that they are acting
as references.</p>
<br />
</div>
<div id="print">
<form>
<input name="print" type="button" value="Send To Printer" onclick="javascript:window.print()" />
<input type="button" value="Email Me" onclick="parent.location='mailto:youremail@putyouremailhere.com?subject=I'd like to talk about your resume'" /></form></div></div>
</body>
</html>

Here is the corresponding CSS that will style the above HTML

*note: You can name the HTML file whatever you want but you must name the CSS file "resume.css" or else change the name of the CSS document in the HTML code to whatever you name the file.<--Resume CSS

Now that you have your resume as a website and loaded
online, you have to make sure employers see it.
One of the best ways that I have found to get this done it to find out a
hiring managers name and email. Once you
have these two pieces of information, you can send a short email introducing
yourself and providing a link to the resume.
This strategy may be hit or miss.
Some people hate receiving unsolicited emails and even if they don’t,
they may not be inclined to click on a link for fear of downloading a
virus. On the other hand, this is your
shot to make a strong and lasting first impression. Hiring managers at good companies sift
through hundreds of resumes no matter what the position. They may build a pool of good resumes that first
come in when the position opens and then stop looking or merely glance over
the rest quickly. Turning your resume into a
website enables them to perform less steps to look at your qualifications and definately makes you stand out. All they have to do is click a link in an
email and bam, there you are.

You can also share your resume website link on professional social networking sites like LinkedIn. Some job opportunities require you to send a resume in via email. These particular jobs are great opportunties to email a link to your resume. If you are using this for the first time, I hope it helps to set you apart from your employment competition!

Do you have any great ideas on how to find a job using the web or social media? Leave them in the comments section.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

If you are using Facebook for personal purposes, it probably
doesn’t matter what your timeline looks like.
If you are a business who utilizes the platform for marketing, a highly
customized timeline full of content will do wonders to engage users.

Tip # 1 Add A Cover Photo

This may seem obvious but many smaller companies, causes and/or
public figures neglect to do this. If
your visitors are not familiar with how the timeline could look, you are
missing out on a chance to show them something interesting, display a large
logo, or an offer. If people are familiar
with how things are supposed to work, they may fault you for not adding this
simple element. Check out this Facebook
timeline cheat sheet that offers dimensions and much more, brought to you by
the Hubspot Blog.

Tip # 2 Talk About Your History

A great way to engage users on your page is to showcase your
company history. It doesn’t matter if
you have a century’s worth of history or only a few months. Add milestones with images that talk about
important events along the way. Showcase
major accomplishments and tranisitions.
People connect with companies on Facebook to learn more about them or
because they identify with that particular organization. Providing more information in the form of who
your company is and what it is all about is something people love to see.

Tip # 3 Image, Images, Images!

The most powerful content online are images and videos. Good videos can be difficult to make quickly
but some eye catching images are relatively easy
to produce and post on your page. Post
images of your business and be sure to include descriptions on them as
well. People love to look at pictures
and you can also use this opportunity to showcase products, people, events or
places that are associated with your business.
You can also take it one step further and display funny or interesting
images that relate to products or services in some way. These are the types of images that “go viral”
or get shared among many users and among many networks rapidly.

Tip # 4 Add Applications

Good content is what keeps people coming back to a Facebook
page or causes them to share it with their friends. Applications are a great way to make your
page more functional. Apps from NorthSocial for example, allow you to provide driving directions, showcase useful
documentation, sign up for mailing lists and a number of other actions. This particular suite of applications also
allows you to fan gate your pages so that you can build your audience. If you are looking for apps that you can try
without spending any money, you can try the Wildfire iframe app or Facebook’s
built in Video and Twitter applications.

Tip # 5 Pin A Post

Facebook’s new timeline allows you to pin a post to the top
of the timeline. This looks just like
any other post except that it will not be pushed down when new content is added
to the timeline. You can use this to
promote a special offer, showcase a particular video or image, give
appreciation to a customer or for whatever else you want.

Is there something I missed? Please leave a comment and let
me know about your timeline customizations.

Monday, June 25, 2012

Here are the slides from the brief presentation I gave to Dr. Gibson's IS class this evening. It was an honor to come back to EMU and offer some tips on how to re-create some of the success I have experinced since graduating last year. I want to take this chance to elaborate on some elements of the presentation and add some additional thoughts that I forgot to mention during my presentation.

Here are the elements I expressed in my presentation in case you missed it and some additional details.

Take on any work even if it is pro-bono (the NPO's you work with in class are a great starting point. Offer services to them.)

Blog about your experiences or blog about web marketing problems that you have solved.

The most important part about blogging and sharing on social media is offering something of value. Always make sure you are adding value.

Showcase your accomplishments and leverage your experience

When you place your experience from these courses on your resume or in your online profiles, don't talk about it like an assignment or "something you did for school". Put it in as you would with any other real world experience, because it is.

Ask your NPO contacts for references.

Ask for recommendations on LinkedIn (if you have done a good job for your NPO's they should be happy to provide this).

Be consistent in your web presence

Be one thing everywhere. If that is a web marketing professional, be that in all of your online profiles that you use for professional purposes. If it is to be a Real Estate agent, then be that in ALL of your online profiles. No matter what it is, be consistent.

Its ok to have personal profiles that you don't use for professional purposes. In fact, try not to mix them.

Provide links in all of your professional profiles to all of your other professional profiles and blog. No matter how an employer or client finds you, they should be able to see the rest of the information out there about you.

Use the same information for all profiles i.e. emails, blog URL's, phone numbers and profile images, etc.

Follow influential industry players

No matter what industry you are planning to work in, there are people who are active in an online world that you can interact with.

If you plan to work in web marketing or social media, check out the profiles of people in my presentation.

Follow industry leaders, reshare their content, reach out to them and meet them in person if you are able to. I'm a fan of meeting people in person before you connect online however if you can pull off an online networking approach then go for it. Sometimes this takes a little more involvement than an in person approach.

Below are the slides that I showed in class. I had a great time speaking this evening and I wish you all the best of luck in your future ventures!

Sunday, February 26, 2012

I have recently seen videos around the web that loop over and over again and I thought that was a pretty cool feature. It is especially effective if you have a short punchy video that you want to autoplay when visitors arrive to your site and continue to play over an over without the user doing anything. At first I thought it would be incredibly easy to find the code to achieve this but I was mistaken. After scouring the web I finally found the answer I was looking for burried in comment threads on some obscure tech website.

So I thought I would spare others the aggravation and make it easy for them to find. A few simple pieces of code were added to the embedded video below to make it start when a visitor arrives on the page and continue to loop. You should note that if you have Google Adsense enabled on a video it is not wise to make this change. Google strictly monitors view counts and the code will either invalidate this data or prompt Google to stop displaying ads on the video all together. If you are tracking view counts for any other reason it is also unwise to make the change.

To start simply copy and paste the video embed code where you want it. Notice that after the www.youtube.com there is the word "embed". Replace this with the letter "v". Then add the following code to make the video loop -- &loop=1. If you want to make the video autoplay simply add &autoplay=1 either before or after the loop command. These lines of code must remain inside the quotations of the entire link URL. The code snippet should look like this.

There are other options out there for looping a Youtube video. For example if you go to your channel on Youtube and select the video you want to play, you can add the word "repeat" to the URL as it is displayed in the browser. Add the word directly after "youtube" in the URL. This takes you to a site where the video is automatically converted for you. The drawback here is that when you go to embed the video, the entire site is embedded in an iframe and you get unsightly scroll bars on the sides of the video, not to mention you are promoting someone else's site.

Friday, December 23, 2011

Facebook has once again changed the way its doing things. This time it involves setting up an application. Because applications are basically a web page displayed from within Facebook, it is easy to create interactive landing pages for your business page. It used to be that you created a new app from within the developer home page. Once all your settings were how you wanted them, you simply visited the “app profile page” and clicked the link in the left column that read “add to my Page”. Now things aren’t as easy.

There is however a pretty simple work around if your purpose for creating an app is to add a landing page to your business or other profile.

Fundamental changes

Facebook now has a new way of adding an application to your page. It requires embedding code that generates a popup window allowing you to add the application to your page. Build a new application just as you would before, aspects of this process have not changed.

This work around outlines how to add an application to your page if you are hosting your own application. Create a new HTML document and insert the following code in a anchor tag.

Insert your applications ID number along with the URL where it is hosted. Paste the code into your new HTML document in the form of a link. You can put what ever text you want into the anchor tag but you must put something otherwise you will not be able to see the link on the new page. Upload your newly created HTML file onto your server and visit the URL. Click the link and this is what you should see.

Select the page or pages you wish to add your application to. The “add to page” button should appear in the lower right hand corner of your screen. Visit the page you added the app to in order to see if you were successful.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Developing an application on Facebook’s platform is a great way to add functionality and customized content to your company page. If you are familiar with coding languages you already have half the work done. Applications on Facebook for the most part are simply web pages hosted from within the site. Aside from some style constraints, most any HTML, CSS, Java, PHP and other languages can be displayed from within your company page using Facebook Applications. Perhaps one of the easiest applications to develop is a landing page for your brand. Check out this one developed for Malloy Incorporated in Ann Arbor (now Edwards Brothers Malloy).

Simply log into your Facebook account and then visit Facebook.com/developer. On the developer home page click “create a new app” in the upper right hand corner. You will be prompted to enter an app display and namespace. These can be whatever you want and can be modified later. Once your new app has been generated you can add a profile image and icon (which later will appear next to your app tab when added to your page). If you are hosting to code for your app on a server you have access too, you will not need to fill out information related to the Cloud server. If not, you can host your code on a third party hosting service provided through Facebook.

Enter your Canvas and secure canvas URL’s under “App on Facebook”. Your canvas URL is the location where your app (HTML, PHP, CSS and/or other documents) are stored. For example http://www.yourserver.com/yourappdocuments.htm. The secure URL should be the same except an S should be added after the http. You must add either a backslash or a question mark after your URL for it to work.

Next create a tab for your app. This will allow it to show up in the right column underneath your profile picture once the app has been added to your company page. The URL’s for the tab should be the same as for the Canvas fields. Once you are finished click the save button.

Adding your app to your page

In the left column there is a link that says “View App Profile Page”. Click it and once on your app’s profile page, there is a link in the left column that says “add to my page”. A list of pages (or apps) that you administer should appear in a popup window. Select the page you would like to add the app to. Go to your page and you should see the new tab in the left column.

Programming note

Displaying an app on your fan page is akin to displaying a web page from within another web page. There are a variety of constraints in terms of style that must be adhered to for all your content to appear. For instance the width of your content should not be greater than 500 to 510 pixels. The height of your content should not be greater than 800 pixels. Further, by default Facebook will produce scroll bars regardless of whether your content will fit into the allotted space. To eliminate these simply use the CSS property “overflow” with a value of “hidden”. This should eliminate both horizontal and vertical scroll bars. You must also modify the settings of your application from the “edit app” page within Facebook developer. Under “settings” and “advanced” scroll down to “Canvas settings”. Here set the Canvas width and height to “fixed” and “settable” respectively.

Adding a customized app to your company page allows you to engage your fans much more effectively. You can add links, images, calls to action, and once you get good at it, you can develop tools that visitors will find useful or fan-gate your page to generate more "likes".

Facebook applications can be used for a lot of different businesses and for all kinds of different uses. Whether you're an accountant or an RV Dealer, you can find some way to leverage Facebook's developer tools to market your business online.

Friday, November 4, 2011

Over the past few days we have been preparing for the launch of the Malloy Incorporated (now Edwards Brothers Malloy) social media and web marketing campaign. I have created a presence for the company on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and of course a blog that is central to the overall effort. The tools that we have at our disposal are amazing in terms of watching the campaign unfold in real time.

Real time data

As part of the effort, an email blast was designed to draw attention to Malloy’s new web presence. This included a carefully crafted email message with links to our social media accounts and blog. The message was sent to over 3,400 Malloy customers using Constant Contact, a contact and email campaign management service. This is one of my first times using Constant Contact and I have to say that I am quite pleased with the functionality and features of the program. It delivers statistics such as bounce rate, spam reports, opt-outs, opens and click-through rates. You can also see the exact recipients that clicked on links in your email as well as those that just opened it.

Initial stats

This campaign launched at 8:34 am on November 4th (this morning) and we already have a stellar 7.7% CTR. It is so neat to see the correlation among people liking the Facebook page or following Malloy on Twitter and the statistics within Constant Contact.